


Belief

by brocanteur



Category: Person of Interest (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, F/F, Future Fic, POV Second Person
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-13
Updated: 2016-04-13
Packaged: 2018-06-02 02:19:08
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,357
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6546520
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brocanteur/pseuds/brocanteur
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“I’m frightened for you,” Harold tells you, six months into it. He has finished stitching the wound on your cheek. He has already said how very sorry he is he could not do a better job of it. You do not care. When you look in the mirror, it is the only thing that makes you smile.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Belief

**Author's Note:**

> Post- “If-then-Else”

“I’m frightened for you,” Harold tells you, six months into it. He has finished stitching the wound on your cheek. He has already said how very sorry he is he could not do a better job of it. You do not care. When you look in the mirror, it is the only thing that makes you smile.

But, “I’m frightened for you.”

Not, “You frighten me,” which is the truth. It is on his face, in his eyes. Fear and pity, which is not what you need from him. There is nothing useful about pity, nothing motivating. You might languish in his pity. You could, if you were someone else. If you were Samantha Groves, perhaps. Perhaps, then. But you are not Samantha Groves. You’re Root. And, no, Harry shouldn’t be frightened for you. Neither should he pity you. Six months in, and you are the destroyer. The god who once whispered in your ear grows quieter and in that near-silence you, alone, have found the path. And on that path you kill, and you kill, and you kill.

A year later, you’re in a bunker, watching dour-faced John clean his guns. He isn’t a talker. He doesn’t share his feelings, and he certainly never tries to get you to share yours. When you sit beside him, he gets up, puts a bottle and two glasses on the table. A fifth of gin is gone before he says anything; before you say anything.

He asks about your guns. Which do you favor? And you laugh a little and take another sip of gin and tell him your favorite gun is the one that happens to be in your hands. His mouth jerks as he nods. It isn’t quite a smile, but it’s the best you’ve ever gotten out of him. Not that you’ve tried; not that you care to try. And, still, you sit there, you drink with him, watch the color rise in his cheeks as the gin warms him up.

You do not want to think of Shaw as you watch him go back to cleaning his Walther. You try not to think of her even as you know that what you are doing puts the mission in jeopardy. And the mission—the Machine hisses Her neutral tones—should be everything.

Harold never says so. Reese doesn’t. They let you do what you would do with or without their permission. What you would do even if the Machine—calculating only outcome, only results—could scream into your ear that you are wrong, that you can’t, that you’ll lead them to their doom. The Machine doesn’t. The Machine is quiet on the matter of Sameen Shaw. As She should be.

You need Shaw. Not just you. (Although _you_ do. You think of her when you shouldn’t. Late at night when you’re vulnerable to your own heart, you think of what someday might have brought you and you bite your hand to keep from screaming.) You _all_ do. Her skill, her relentlessness. Samaritan has taken one of your limbs, and in the stillness of your bed, your body aches for it; feels it, sometimes, like a cold, forbidding phantom.

You are unwell, for a while. For a bit, you go somewhat out of your mind. You leave New York. The Machine, She speaks intermittently, and then only in a code She has devised just for you. She leads and you follow without question, faith and hope distant memories. There is only the task at hand. But it isn’t enough. She is so quiet, and you’re dying to be warm. The only heat you gather is the heat of violence. It’s good enough. Maybe She understands that. Maybe her ones and zeroes are the fabric of you.

When you return to Harry, to war, you bear a new set of scars. They suit you. Battle suits you.

It isn’t until long after you’ve stopped searching for Shaw that she reappears. She shoots a nameless Samaritan operative moments before he can put a bullet through your head. Moments before you’re disconnected from the Machine, Shaw is there, brutally efficient. When it’s done, she sizes you up, stares at the scar on your face. Puts her thumb to it, a little rough, while you close your eyes and shudder. And you’re smiling, you’re sure of it. When you open your eyes, she’s still just looking at you, her mouth hard-set but her eyes warm, warmer than you’ve ever seen them. But her face is gaunt. She is too thin.

“When’d you get that?” she murmurs. You’d forgotten her voice. How matter-of-fact she was. Your blood pumps fast, faster. Your fingers stretch towards her.

“I don’t remember,” you say. Does your face hurt from smiling? You force yourself to stop, but you can’t tear your eyes away from hers. With your gaze, you devour. “A long time ago.” And then, “Where did you come from? Where–?”

“Long story.” She grabs you by the elbow, pulls while she walks to the exit. “Buy me dinner first. I’m starving.”

After filling up on dim sum and Tsingtao, Shaw says, “It was touch-and-go, but they wanted me. Needed me. So they nursed me back to health and brought in the interrogators. Human intelligence, they said. Fuck you, I told them. They tried. They really, really tried.”

“You didn’t say a word,” you say, awed.

“‘Course not. But they held on to me. Locked me up, threw away the key.” She smiles, almost; her eyes are dead. “They thought they could break me, I guess.”

“They didn’t know who they were dealing with,” you say, and her eyes spark for a moment.

After a pause, she asks, “Did you think I was dead?”

“No,” you say. “I looked for you.” _You looked and looked and looked._

“Yeah,” she says, flat but genial. “I believe you.” She looks at you a few beats longer, until she turns away for another swig of beer from a bottle that is soon empty. A glance is all she gives you as she shrugs into her coat; it’s too big on her. You want to wrap her up in your arms, but you shove your fists into your pockets instead.

She’s already walking away when she calls to you: “Come on. I’ve got a date with a dog.”

That night, you give her your bed and tell her you’ll sleep on the couch but she shakes her head, impatiently. “No, no, no. It’s cold, and I don’t mind the company.”

“Oh, _honey_ , you _missed_ me,” you say, feeling something, _something_ , for the first time in forever. So when she holds up her finger and scolds you, “Don’t ruin it,” you sink against her and sigh. You touch her; your hands on her torso, your fingers skating over the ridge of her spine. Anger swells inside of you when you think of all the time that was stolen.

She hisses when your grip tightens and your nails press into her bruised skin.

“I’m sorry,” you whisper, but you can tell that she doesn’t want it. She rolls her eyes and bites your lip.

“Fuck that,” she says, kissing you. Really kissing you. Hard and full of trying to forget. You rake your nails over her back, and she moans into your mouth.

You catch fire. Just like that, you catch fire.

Later, she will leave the bed. She’ll slip out from under your arm and you’ll blink up at her. “Thanks,” she’ll say, quiet, haunting the edges of the room. “I’ll take the couch.”

“Don’t leave,” you’ll say. “Not until I see you in the morning. I need to see you in the morning.”

She will straighten, her hair loose, her chest dotted black and blue, her scars worse than any you’ve collected; red where you kissed her, where you pressed your lips until you could see the blood pooling beneath her skin. You’d held your good ear over her heart, listened to it beating fast, faster. When she came, you kissed her until she pushed you away, looking for air, to breathe. Alive.

“I won’t leave.”

And you’ll believe her.


End file.
